


faithless love

by presumptious_quirks



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Cars and Other Forms of Magical Torture Systems, Charlie needs a break, Draco is not doing well, F/M, Hermione is Stressed, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Relic Hunts and Other Forms of Flirting, draco hermione and charlie's Very Odd Friendship that actually works, harry is not having a great time, no draco/hermione/charlie, theo however is having the time of his life, uh light stabbing i guess
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-07
Updated: 2020-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:14:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27433369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/presumptious_quirks/pseuds/presumptious_quirks
Summary: **ON HIATUS UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE**Charlie Weasley grimaced, resolutely avoiding eye contact. ‘There’s a – small caveat to the agreement, you see.’‘Well? What is it?’ Granger asked impatiently, tapping her fingernails on the file in front of her, in a patternclearlycalculated to aggravate the headache building inexorably in Draco's temples.‘I, uh –’ Weasley stalled, unsurprisingly unsure of how exactly to break this particular piece of news, and Draco sighed.‘You have to come with us,’ he said flatly, and for the first time in the eleven years he had been forced to know her, Hermione Granger lost the power of coherent speech.Despite both their best intentions, Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger are required -forced, Granger insists, though Draco's pretty sure she's the one who actually had anoption- to work together (go on a wild goose chase in obscure Albanian forests) to find a relic that Kingsley Shackleboltsaysis vital to the 'continued development of the Wizarding World'.Yeah,right.
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Draco Malfoy, Theodore Nott/Harry Potter
Comments: 7
Kudos: 20





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> so what if you put my three favourite characters in a story, toss in some unresolved trauma, dramione, and charlie weasley's unfailing ability to be So Done
> 
> and get this

The air was musty, flecked with tiny particles of grass dust turned golden and amber with the faltering evening sunlight.

The heat pressed onto Draco like a tangible weight, the sun catching the stray strands of hair falling forward into his face as he knelt, wand in hand, his eyes fixed on the runes floating softly in the hazy air in front of him. The other man watched him work soundlessly, standing a few feet behind.

‘It’s here,’ he said without looking up, his attention focused on the glowing forms.

The man stifled an involuntary grimace. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Certain,' Draco said, the word tinged with half-amused offence.

The man shifted uncomfortably, bringing a hand up to push his flame-like red hair back from his face, green eyes screwed up against the setting sun that picked out the dark outlines of the tattoos covering his skin. ‘So…do we take it now? Or is there some obscure pureblood ritual we have to perform with, like, house elf blood and interpretive dancing?’

Draco rose from his kneeling position swiftly, banishing the runes with a flick of his wand. 

‘Not precisely,’ he said languidly, smirking at the look of apprehension his unwilling colleague gave him.

‘Okay, but…?’ 

‘I need a particular variety of monkshood; it’s rare. Practically impossible to find.’

‘And?’ The man asked, his voice trailing off nervously.

Draco smiled, turning away to face into the setting sun. It was a good kind of heat, he decided leisurely, the kind that settled in one’s bones. It would be calming, almost, were it not for the presence of a Weasley and three dozen Aurors milling about uselessly in the background. He’d been amused, at first, when he’d seen the amount of guards the DMLE had sent; practically an entire section. Now it was merely a burdensome annoyance. 

Like this job.

‘You want your relic?’ He said, turning to meet Weasley’s eyes. 

He nodded warily.

Draco grinned.

‘I’ll need a deal.’  
*

‘No. _Absolutely_ not.’ Hermione Granger snapped, her eyes narrowed into furious slits.

Draco smiled languidly. She’d grown a bit, he decided; or maybe she’d just filled out a little into that near-sentient mass of hair she’d dragged about with her for their school years; either way, she’d changed. Still bossy, apparently, and incurably addicted to acts of senseless heroism.

No, Draco amended thoughtfully, that was always Potter’s failing. Granger had always been ruthless, even in school ( _especially in school_ , he thought wryly) and her particular brand of bravery was the kind that never quite sat well with the hopeless fools populating Gryffindor. The kind that looked before it leapt. The kind that _considered_ , that _analysed_ , the kind that brought the Dark Lord to his knees through preparation and cunning and not sheer force of will.

The kind, Draco thought uncomfortably, that was rather too reminiscent of Slytherin.

Beside him Weasley sighed, running his hand through his obnoxiously ginger hair. ‘Believe me, Hermione, if there was another option, I wouldn’t be here.’

‘It’s not your fault, Charlie.’ Granger said kindly, which did not at all sit well with Draco. 

‘Well,’ he drawled, ‘Sorry to burst your little Weasley-induced delusional bubble, but my suggestion involved far less dithering. Almost stress-free, in fact.’ He smiled insincerely.

Granger narrowed her eyes further – how, Draco did not know; it was clearly impossible, and thus implied that she had finally attained her apparent goal of _breaking the fundamental laws of the universe_.

‘You-’ she said, punctuating each word with a jab of her finger on the scratched mahogany desk, ‘-are on _very thin ice_ , Malfoy.’

His smile widened; he couldn’t help it. 

Granger’s eyes flared, startled.

Weasley coughed.

‘ _If_ –’ he said, and just like that the spell was broken, ‘– if we could get back to the point in hand, Hermione –’

Granger snapped her gaze back to him, a faint blush crawling up her neck. Draco watched it absently, a little transfixed by the colour on her warm bronze skin.

‘Of course, Charlie, let me just send a message to the DMLE, arrange a guard detail –’

‘Ah. Bit of a problem there.’ Weasley said, bringing a hand up to rub the back of his neck.

Granger stared at him. ‘What?’

Draco grinned, cataloguing the way her eyes instantly tracked the movement before darting away. 

_Oh, this is going to be fun_.

Charlie Weasley grimaced, resolutely avoiding eye contact. ‘There’s a – small caveat to the agreement, you see.’

‘Well? What is it?’ She asked impatiently, tapping her fingernails on the file in front of her, in a pattern _clearly_ calculated to aggravate the headache building inexorably in Draco's temples.

‘I, uh –’ Weasley stalled, unsurprisingly unsure of how exactly to break this particular piece of news, and Draco sighed.

‘You have to come with us,’ he said flatly, and for the first time in the eleven years he had been forced to know her, Hermione Granger lost the power of coherent speech.


	2. my sleepless night

‘Draco, what the fuck?’ Pansy said the instant she stepped through the fireplace. ‘Are you mad, or are they threatening you?’

Draco shrugged apathetically, his head buried in his hands. ‘I have no idea, Pans.’

He’d been plagued by a perpetual headache since he got home, courtesy of Granger’s compulsive planning and truly baffling capacity for multitasking, and the very last thing he wanted – apart from a repeat of today’s impromptu torture session – was to do anything that involved even the slightest expense of energy. Pansy, however, typically required the full attention of her victims – _conversation partners_ \- and despite having known her for most of his life, Draco had yet to discover a method of ignoring her that actually worked.

She was fucking _terrifying_.

‘You, a Weasley – a fucking _Weasley_ , D, what the _fuck_ – and _Granger_?’ She shook her head. (Or at least, Draco assumed she did. He couldn’t actually see her from his position of abject misery, but it felt like something she would do). ‘It’s going to be a fucking bloodbath.’

‘I know,’ he said, through the extreme despair currently overwhelming him. 

This whole deal had _not_ been a good idea. 

There was the sound of ice clinking in a glass and then Pansy dumped a glass of Firewhiskey in his hands unceremoniously. Draco downed the whole thing straight, which probably wasn’t as good an idea as he thought it was (in keeping with the rest of his ideas that day). Once his eyes had stopped watering enough for him to see without everything instantly becoming an amorphous blur of colour, he coughed weakly.

‘That’s, uh, nice of you, Pans,’ he said, regretting his life choices.

She snorted. ‘You’re going on a forced roadtrip with two Gryffindors in like, a week, of course I’m being nice – not because I actually care about your continued existence at all.’ 

'Likewise,’ he agreed, because it is a truth universally acknowledged that Slytherins cannot show affection in normal, non-death-threatening ways. He can count on one hand the number of times Pansy has admitted to feeling any sort of begrudging fondness for him, Blaise, and Theo; even then, she always said it with a kind of baffled rage, as if she couldn’t figure out why she liked them in the first place. 

The root of it, of course, stemmed from the unfortunate fact of their enforced proximity since early childhood; one cannot be contained in the same rather unwelcoming space for seven years of life and not feel some kind of compulsion to ensure the safety and wellbeing of those similarly contained. 

There’d been literal skulls in that fucking dungeon Salazar Slytherin had decided to shove his house in. _Skulls_. For _children_.

And anyway, they’d all known each other since birth; pureblood families tended to be quite close-knit, as certain recent events might have shown. Draco’s first memories were of his mother, his toy broom, and Pansy, Theo, and Blaise playing pranks on each other. 

After the war, things had been a bit different. Namely, Draco had been put on trial (Azkaban was not his idea of a relaxing vacation), acquitted on the tenuous testimony of the Chosen One himself (the Boy Who Clung Limpet-Like to Life), and then had been made to suffer the indignity of watching his father be sentenced to life imprisonment in Azkaban (however deserved that incarceration was).

His mother had practically exiled herself to the family estate in France, and then, on top of all this, his own estate had been requisitioned for some kind of mass de-Dark-Magic-ing by the Ministry, leaving him with only the London townhouse. 

That was, in fact, the worst part of the whole deal.

Draco managed the rest perfectly well; even the loss of his personal collection of Quidditch figurines, which were presumably still in his room at the Manor. The thought of Aurors rummaging through his personal effects was rather repulsive, but on the whole Draco thought he’d been remarkably restrained in his reactions. 

_Draco, you were a wreck for a total of eight months after your trial_ , Theo had said unsympathetically when Draco had mentioned this to him. _We had to take turns to come round and sit with you when they sent you that letter about breaking the bust of your great-grandfather._

So, not _perfectly_ well. But he hadn’t started a cult or committed a hate crime, so at least he had not sunk to the level of his father and his aunt; the bar might be low, but the important thing was to stay positive. 

And that was what Draco had done, for the last three years. Blaise had fucked off to Italy most of the time, family vineyards calling, Theo had gone back to Hogwarts to get his NEWTs and then promptly did nothing with them except tinker about with the exceptionally dangerous Dark artefacts in his (unfairly-not-requisitioned) estate, and Pansy had – surprisingly – become a lawyer.

In America. For _Muggles_. (Well; Muggle-Wizard Relations. Draco still couldn’t believe her bravado; the daughter of a Death Eater, liaising between wizards and the people her parents had actively tried to wipe out).

And Draco? 

Draco had become, to the surprise of everyone who thought they knew him and no one who actually did know him, an alchemist with a sideline in magical relics. 

He’d always been good at Potions (not actually due to Snape’s favouritism, _shut up, Potter_ ) and in the resulting vacuum that his father’s imprisonment had created, he’d gotten quite bored. There was only so much moping one could do in a townhouse; even the magically enlarged Malfoy property had been a bit dull after a while. 

(And _silent_. Every hallway, every empty room, every corner of that old, creaking house had been so silent. Malfoy Manor had never been _loud_ , but there were always people somewhere. There was always his mother, the elves, his father's friends with their booming voices and later, their scheming whispers. 

There had been _something_ , even when the Dark Lord invaded them; the sibilant, nightmarish hiss of Nagini, the scratch of Bellatrix’s laughter, the screams of her victims. There'd been _too much_ noise, sometimes, when Draco was lying in bed in his childhood room where he'd been safe for so long, listening to the cries of the dying echoing below him.

Being _alone_ , now, the silence of his house felt unnatural, an eery quiet creeping insidiously through the halls. 

It almost drove him mad.)

He’d taken to wandering about aimlessly, in a rather precise imitation of a lovelorn damsel from medieval myths; replete with hair to match. 

The Malfoy hair genes had always been _excellent_. 

There was a potions laboratory in the lower floor. It was as gloomy as everything else, decorated in a tasteful pitch-black theme with occasional skeletal objects at intervals, glowing ominously, just to add colour. Draco had spent a total of four seconds staring at the dust-encrusted room in front of him before deciding _fuck it_ , and spelling the whole thing a brilliant, virulent green. 

Again, not perhaps the best of ideas, but it had pleased him at the time, and there was only so much black décor one could take before it became excessive. The Ministry hadn’t removed his wand, thank Merlin, and as much as he’d hated his mother’s decorating lessons as a child, they did come in handy now he only had the help of a very old, very recalcitrant elf. He couldn’t count the number of times his life had been saved by a handy knitting spell.

Speaking of: his mother had not been impressed by his forays into experimental potionmaking. 

_Draco, dear, the Dark Lord lived in our house for two years_ , she’d said, _aren’t you a little tired of potentially explosive experiences?_

Any potential explosions would have been a welcome deviation from the uncompromising dullness of ordinary life, Draco had told her, and they'd tacitly agreed to disgree, _as usual_. 

Pansy, Theo, and Blaise still dragged him out for drinks and harassed him at home, but they had their own lives to deal with; the war had not been kind to any of his friends.

The war had not been kind to _anyone_.

And his mother could keep her misplaced advice; _she_ was not exactly a perfect example of how to deal with things. In the first few months after Lucius’s trial, she’d disappeared to France, and - despite owling regularly - showed no intention of ever returning. 

Draco had to admit, being effectively abandoned by both his parents was not quite what he’d envisioned for his adulthood.

Another thing he had not envisioned was this fucking _job_. 

When he’d first taken to potionmaking, it’d been a distraction, a way to forget the circumstances surrounding him, lose himself in something difficult and rewarding for hours at a time. 

Something he could control, even if the rest of his life was under the control of others. 

At first all he made were the potions he’d learnt at school, the advanced program, the extra ones Snape had taught him in a futile attempt to protect him, but the more he made the easier it was, suddenly, to adjust an ingredient or throw in a counterclockwise stroke, almost on instinct, and then - the end product changed, became more precise, more efficient.

He’d invented a healing potion by accident one night, when he’d been there for hours, brewing an old recipe he’d found in the library. He’d run out of common monkshood, and substituted southern blue instead - a common enough alteration, except the end result was ten times more powerful than the original potion.

Draco’s reputation, seemingly irreparably damaged by the war, suddenly garnered an extra shine. 

*

When he was twenty years old, Draco Malfoy became the apprentice of Lerato de Bruyn, legendary potionmaker and world-renowned relic recovery expert, who also happened to be the most terrifying woman he’d ever encountered (and his aunt was Bellatrix Lestrange).

‘Ah, the Death Eater,’ she’d said upon meeting him, and then fixed him with a very assessing, very formidable stare. 

Draco had swallowed and tried not to fidget under her gaze.

'You’ll do.’ 

*

‘So, you’re what, an itinerant potioneer?’ Weasley said, and Draco repressed the urge to strangle him, _again_.

‘Something like that,’ he conceded, shifting in his cramped, vinyl-covered seat. Weasley grinned at the glare Draco sent at him, tapping his fingers irritatingly to the beat of the song playing over the scratchy sound system in the - _car_ , it was called, apparently. 

Draco doubted that _immensely_. 

‘Do you, like, take orders?’ 

Draco glared, jaw tensing. ‘I take _requests_ ,’ he said, because the distinction was not merely important, it was _vital_. ‘People hire my services and follow my professional advice.’

 _Unlike this_ , he thought a tad mutinously. The Ministry hadn’t exactly given him a choice; _help us or lose those very generous privileges no Death Eater like you should ever have_ had been the gist of it, although Shacklebolt had put it rather more diplomatically. Draco probably would have been less offended if he’d just told him; it wasn’t like their suspicion was unjustified, though Draco liked to think he’d improved over the past three years. 

Lerato had certainly ensured that. 

(She was really fucking scary).

Not content with sending a literal army of Aurors to monitor his preliminary investigations, the DMLE had insisted on sending Weasley to pick him up in this automated _contraption_ every time he needed to go somewhere. 

Like he hadn’t been abroad for a year already, running around _perfectly free_ to do his little Death Eater-y stunts (read: _normal life experiences_ ) and set fire to buildings or whatever it was the Ministry seemed convinced he would do if not under constant, Weasley-assisted supervision. 

But, if he was being honest, which was really fucking unlikely, this Weasley was probably the least annoying one out of all of them (and Merlin, there were _so many_ ). Draco couldn't contemplate what mental (and physical) torment he’d have to endure if they’d assigned the Weaslette instead. 

Comparatively speaking, he was almost _grateful_ he’d got this one. 

Almost.

The late afternoon sun filtered in through the glass at the front of the - _car_ \- and bathed the battered interior in shades of burnt orange and gold, picking out the odd assortment of buttons and dials on the board in between the two seats. Draco eyed them warily in his peripheral vision. According to what he’d seen Weasley do, the dial to the right controlled the music (well, the noise Weasley seemed to consider music), though quite how it did that Draco didn’t know. 

This car thing was utterly baffling. 

Draco _hated_ being baffled.

With a final glare at Weasley, who was now singing along to the music, _like an idiot_ , Draco closed his eyes and tried to forget he’d ever agreed to this.

*

To put it lightly, things were not going well.

And, to be perfectly frank, for once it was not entirely Draco’s fault.

Granger was just too fucking persistent. 

‘Malfoy, have you read Lerato de Bruyn’s recent paper on the proper care and prevention of relic-related diseases and infections?’ She said, appearing at his elbow like a death-wish in human form, frowning down at his diagnostic report like it had personally offended her.

Knowing her, it probably had.

‘Unless you've forgotten, Granger,’ Draco said, ‘I apprenticed under the woman herself for a year. You would be hard pressed to find a paper of hers I _haven't_ read.’

‘Are you certain? Perhaps you merely overlooked it; I'm sure it must be difficult to concentrate for long periods of time without the comforts of your trust fund.’

Draco sighed, snapping the clasp on his briefcase shut. 

She was clearly never letting that go.

‘I never actually had a trust fund, Granger, my parents paid me an allowance - though _of course_ I would never expect you to understand the distinction. I inherit the family fortune and estate upon my father's death.’ 

Granger smiled thinly. ‘And do you have a predicted timeline for that occurrence? I’m sure several people would be _delighted_ to know.’

Draco smiled back insincerely. ‘I'll try to keep you informed.’

‘Good,’ she said, still smiling.

‘Good,’ he agreed, likewise. 

‘We good here?’ Charlie popped his head round the door and instantly retracted it. From outside they heard him mutter a muted _best not go in there_ to the intern about to enter.

Granger turned back to the packing cases piled up on one side of the room, her apparently permanent frown now set firmly in place again. 

Draco could feel another headache building, because apparently it was _that_ kind of day. 

_Typical_.


	3. my best laid plan

The fog burned in the streets, lit up by the streetlamps in a kaleidoscope of yellow and orange that stood out against the backdrop of the darkening sky. 

Hermione eyed the heavy clouds irritably, casting a preemptive protective spell as she stepped out of the Ministry. Her hair whipped across her face as the wind picked up suddenly, howling down the street in screams of high, unsettling noise that pressed against her ears, muffling everything else except the sound of the hurried sweeps of air.

‘Night, Miss Granger,’ Auror Curlew said as he jogged past her, his arms raised protectively across his face as the wind buffeted his hair.

‘Good night, Tom.’ Her voice was muted by the fog swelling around them, but the wind caught her words and spun them away to the man, as if to prove winds could have conversation too. Her father used to say that, when she was young and frightened by a storm.

_Nothing to be afraid of, Mione. Just the wind talking._

Brushing the errant memory away like she’d taken her father's memory of her, Hermione turned into the wind, heading towards the Apparition Point at the end of the street. As if by magnetic force, her thoughts returned to the topic that had been bothering her ever since Kingsley had told her of it.

_There’s a relic, Hermione. An old one. Very dark magic, too, almost as dark as - well._

_Voldemort._

A stray sheet of newspaper scudded past her, blown along by the wind as it sped over itself, twisting and swirling in the air, its edges scuffing the pavement. A snatched glimpse of a headline proclaimed _disappearance of Junior Auror_ in ink smudged by its erratic contact with the wet street, a page billowing open in the wind and furling over itself. Hermione watched its path absently.

_How bad is it?_

_We don't know. MACUSA wants it back; it was taken from an old family of theirs in the twenties, and then - who knows._

_Why are you telling me?_

_We recently received some information; a tip off, if you will. Someone is looking for that relic, and - for want of a better word - we are completely and utterly lost if they find it._

_Why?_

_Because that relic has the potential to destroy the very fabric of this world, Hermione._

A sharp crack, pulled from the air by the automatic motion of her wand, spun her into space and landed her safely in the hallway of Grimmauld Place. 

_The very fabric of this world._

Her scarf was draped across the nearest chair, her shoes discarded in the doorway, coat slung onto the rack. 

_The very fabric._

Something panicked and small took up residence in her chest, fluttering beneath her ribcage like a desperate bird. 

This world - this world they’d spent so long securing, this world that she had fought for, that Harry had _died_ for - would be lost. 

Hermione was afraid, very afraid, that if it was then she would be lost too.

‘Mione?’ Harry’s voice echoed down the hallway, piercing her sudden, overwhelming panic with its easy familiarity, and not for the first time she sank into the comfort that it brought her. 

They’d be alright, Harry and the Weasleys and her friends; they had to be. 

She would ensure it.

‘Hi, Harry,’ she said calmly, walking into the kitchen and hiding, as always, the instant relief that came whenever she saw him alive and well. The sight of his dead body was a recurring element in her nightmares; it took constant reminders that he was here, _safe_ , before she could banish it from her mind.

At this rate she was rather sure it was her boggart. 

‘Beef stew alright?’ He asked, looking up from where he was steadily chopping vegetables by hand, in complete disregard of the very simple cooking charms Hermione knew Molly had taught him. 

‘That sounds lovely,’ she said, electing to ignore his flagrant disregard for proper magical use. It probably wouldn't do to admonish him for the sixth consecutive time on the subject; even she could tell it was a doomed endeavour.

His hair was a mess; again. Hermione despaired of it.

‘How was work?’ 

Harry sighed, a common occurrence these days whenever the topic of his employment cropped up.

‘Same old, I guess,’ he said despondently, frustration burring with the exhaustion in his voice. ‘Robards has got me working on a disappearance; a junior Auror. One of our own.’

Hermione winced in sympathy.

‘I’m sorry.’

He waved her apology away wearily. ‘It’s not your fault. By all accounts he wasn't very popular; most people think he just - didn't show up one day. Got his head bashed in in an alley somewhere; no one cares.’

_No one cares._

Hermione breathed in slowly, the panic rising up within her once more. She never knew if it was logical or irrational, to feel so deeply about the state of their society, but this - this was something out of her control, an abstract concept that nevertheless haunted her. 

What would they do, if no one cared enough to notice? 

_The very fabric of this world._

Were they lost already?

‘Mione?’

She snapped out of her ever downward spiralling contemplation and met his gaze.

‘Sorry, Harry, I just,’ she swallowed, pausing. ‘It just seems so unfair.’

He nodded somberly, his normally bright green eyes unusually dim with sadness. 

‘I know, Hermione. I know.’

*

Ron had always told her she was too intense; she tried too hard.

Looking back, it was rather indicative of his feelings for her, given that they had been fighting a literal _war_ at the time, but Hermione knew he'd meant well, at least. 

Even if he'd never quite managed to figure out the difference between his hopes and hers.

He wanted to go back; he wanted everything to return to how it was before the war. 

Hermione wanted to go forward.

And that, at the heart of it all, was the reason they hadn't worked out. 

At first, in those first few months after the war, when everyone was riding a wave of pure euphoria, still high on triumph, they'd tried to make it work.

Hermione had ignored the stiltedness and the static, and later, the arguments, had suffered through countless awkward conversations with well-meaning Weasleys, wink-wink nods to _so when are you two going to tie the knot then_ , until - one two many disastrous dinners later - she'd finally accepted that whatever she had hoped this could be was long gone. 

Ron took it well, at least. Things were awkward for awhile, but in the end they had been friends before they were lovers, and maybe if the war hadn't got in the way that's all they'd ever have been.

It was far better to realise now, Hermione told herself, no matter how unfair it felt. 

*

Speaking of injustice:

‘You want me to do _what?_ ' 

Head Auror Robards avoided her gaze with the neat sidestepping of a man well-versed in diplomacy. 

‘It's not exactly protocol -’

‘Not protocol?’ Hermione snapped. ‘It's barely _legal_!’

A _Death Eater_. Working for the _Ministry_. 

Not just any Death Eater too: _Draco fucking Malfoy himself._

Hermione couldn't be the only one who saw something wrong in this.

‘Mr Malfoy _was_ acquitted, Hermione,’ Robards reminded her, shuffling papers on his desk absently. A copy of yesterday's newspaper lay open before him, the headline staring up at her again: _disappearance of Junior Auror in fluke attack last..._

‘Hardly. He only got off because Harry testified, and he’d never even have got that if his mother hadn't done what she did,’ Hermione fumed.

If Narcissa Malfoy had not been such a stone cold bitch then Harry would be dead and they'd all be annihilated; that Hermione could live with. (The gratitude bit, not the potential annihilation). What she couldn't stand was the utter insolence of Malfoy himself; what _possible_ right did he have to go and make a world-renowned potionmaking reputation for himself, when he was _directly responsible_ for letting Death Eaters into Hogwarts, the one place Hermione had hoped would remain _safe_.

‘Look, Miss Granger,’ Robards said, pinching the bridge of his nose, ‘We need him. No matter how much you hate him, no matter if the reasons for his acquittal were less than spotless, we need him. There is no one else with his level of expertise.’

‘Charlie’s the expert in this field!’

Robards inclined his head.

‘Mr Weasley is a very skilled, valuable member of our team, yes - but he's _not enough_.'

Hermione ground her teeth together; a habit she'd picked up during sixth year when Harry would _not_ shut up about Malfoy. Clearly she was doomed forever to always have the ferret hanging around like the spectre at the feast, only slightly more corporeal.

‘Alright, sir, he may be your only option,’ she said, extremely fucking incensed at the prospect of agreeing with Robards’ assessment, ‘But that doesn't answer my question: why am _I_ here?’

‘Ah. Yes.’ Robards shifted in his seat. ‘That.’

Hermione raised an eyebrow.

‘Look, Miss Granger, I'm going to be honest with you here,’ he confessed. Hermione was slightly put out by the implication that he had not been being honest before. ‘We have a bit of a problem. I presume you’ve heard of the disappearance of one of our people?’

She nodded, unsure where this was going.

‘You put Harry on the case.’

He winced.

‘Yes, we did, which - I realise he’s your friend, Miss Granger, and no one is more grateful for what he did for the Wizarding World than I, but one has to face the fact that as an Auror, he's just _not that good_.’ 

_What?_ Hermione felt her temper, already stretched, boiling up in her chest. What possible right did this barely-sentient pen-pusher have to criticise Harry, who may not have been the most _logical_ of thinkers but who - _oh_. 

Yeah.

While Harry was a great friend, one of the bravest people she’d ever known, there was the annoying fact that everything he'd ever done had been based on pure instinct, which.

Well.

Might not have been the best thing, in this line of work. You couldn't really put ‘ _felt like they were guilty_ ’ as reason for arrest, no matter how right your instincts had been up til then. 

Hermione loved Harry, she really did, but she couldn't say she hadn't had her doubts about his career choices. Being an Auror, although a very altruistic choice, always seemed to be such an _expected_ path to go down.

Hermione would be the first to advocate prior planning, but Harry had spent his formative years being mistreated at home and manipulated at school, not to mention defeating a Dark Lord; going into further law enforcement didn't seem like the healthiest of options.

She felt a twinge of guilt at the thought. Harry would hate it if he thought she doubted him; and she didn't. Not really. Not in any of the ways that mattered. He was still her friend; he just wasn't a good Auror.

Hermione just hoped he realised that for himself. 

‘I presume it isn't that important, then?’ She said, following the implications through to the logical conclusion. ‘The case; if you put Harry on it.’

Robards nodded. ‘Yes, that was our reasoning at first. But recently - rather despite his shortcomings in other areas, Potter is still excellent at fieldwork - he turned up some information that put a different spin on things.’

Hermione nodded impatiently. No matter how long she worked in these circles, she'd never quite get used to how fucking _long_ the department Heads took to get to the point. (She'd once seen Head of Magical Games and Recreation talk around the subject for _two hours_ ).

‘Turns out, this disappearance might have links to an underground network specialising in black market magical artifacts.’

Hermione's eyes widened. ‘You mean -?’

Robards nodded sternly. 

‘Yes, Miss Granger,’ he said. ‘I mean relics.’

*

Harry was not having a good day. 

Harry had not been having a good day for a _number of weeks now_. 

First there had been the veritable _mountain_ of paperwork he'd had to fill in, then his partner had called in such for the _fourth day in a row_ , and then his preliminary report on that disappearance had been ‘mislaid’, whatever the fuck that meant.

And now, to top it all, he had to deal with Theodore fucking Nott.

‘Problem, Auror Potter?’ The annoyance in person asked, smiling cheerfully with more than a hint of madness in his amused green gaze.

Harry ground his teeth, a habit he'd picked up in sixth year when Malfoy had never let up being a stupid Death Eater for one single second.

‘No, Nott,’ he forced out through gritted teeth. ‘Unless there's something you'd like to confess.’

Nott adopted an expression of wounded innocence.

‘I, Auror Potter?’ He smiled suggestively. ‘Oh, there's plenty of things I would like to confess,’ he said, leaning back in his chair and raking his eyes over Harry's form. ‘Starting with a number of improper - some might say borderline _indecent_ \- thoughts I've been having about a certain Auror -’

‘Shut it, Nott,’ Harry ground out, trying to stop the flush creeping up his neck as Nott laughed easily, tilting his head back in a _clear, obvious_ attempt to provoke Harry with the lithe lines of his neck and the dip at his collarbone and the open collar of his shirt where the black edges of a tattoo was exposed on the triangle of skin - 

Harry shut down that line of thought forcefully, wrenching his mind back to the case in hand. Nott tilted back further in his chair, meeting Harry's eyes and smirking like he knew what had just happened.

‘What do you know about magical artifact smuggling?’ Harry asked, and all traces of laughter vanished from Nott’s face.

‘ _Illegal_ magical artifact smuggling?’ He said, raising an eyebrow. ‘I'm shocked, Auror Potter. Why on earth would you think that _I_ had anything to so with something _against the law?_ '

Harry glanced at the file open before him.

‘You were seen entering Knockturn Alley the day before a Junior Auror of ours went missing down there,’ he said, tamping down the reflexive bite of guilt he felt at the mention of Davis.

Nott spread his hands out, gesturing to the interrogation room around them.

‘I had some business concerns to take care of,’ he said. ‘You can check my accounts if you like; I assure you, they're all in order.’

Harry cursed silently. He knew Nott’s type; you could never find anything concrete on them; they were too careful. 

‘What about the Rembrandt Circle?’ He said carefully, going out on a limb. The name had cropped up in his investigation; a long shot, but he was running out of options.

Nott’s chair slammed back down onto all fours.

‘Now, what do you know about _that?_ ’ 

*

_Five Days Earlier_

Junior Auror Malcolm Davis was not the sort to pass up an opportunity to slack off; not with his pay level, not with his prospects, not with his mother's pureblood legacy in his veins doing nothing but ruin his life.

His father had been a halfblood; fair enough, then. Malcolm didn't really care about all that, but it was his mother's blood status that had caused all his trouble. She'd been the younger sister of Caleb Avery; a Death Eater, with all the baggage that came with it.

It didn't matter that his father was half-Muggle, or that Malcolm had never once spoken against Muggles; he was a Slytherin, and his uncle was a Death Eater, and those two things were enough to condemn him in the eyes of society.

Things had been tough, after the war. He'd only got into the Auror program because he was one of the Slytherins who'd come back to the battle, and even then the knee-jerk prejudice against his House had made it near-impossible for him to work anywhere else. He didn't want to be an Auror; he never had, but they were hiring and he was out of luck.

And so here he was, three years later, a Junior Auror with nothing to do except investigate noise complaints.

Oh, and his little business on the side, of course.

The pay he received from the DMLE was really not enough to pay for food and the rent _and_ the little extras he'd been accustomed to; it wasn't surprising that he'd turned to this.

It was small jobs; a file here, a package there; nothing too serious. Nothing that couldn't be explained away. He'd made sure of that, too well aware of what happened when a Slytherin slipped up these days.

Which made it all the more surprising when he'd been approached by the woman in the Muggle clothing, who wielded her wand like a sword and yet knew spells Malcolm had never even heard of.

The job had been simple, though, and the pay was good.

_A single file, from the Archives._

Child’s play; he'd done it between one unscheduled coffee break and another, then nipped down Knockturn Alley that night to hand it over and collect his fee. 

Easy.

In fact, it was only as he felt the knife enter his ribcage that he reflected that perhaps it had been a bit _too_ easy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> not me inserting my extreme love of Theo Nott into everything i write what do you mean i'm obsessed
> 
> Edit: ON HIATUS UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from Hoax by Taylor Swift. 
> 
> [Tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/presumptious-quirks)


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